The Green Hornet (TV series)
The Green Hornet is a television show on the ABC US television network. It aired for the 1966–1967 TV season, and starred Van Williams as the Green Hornet/Britt Reid and Bruce Lee as Kato. The Green Hornet followed the adventures of playboy and media mogul Britt Reid, who in as the masked vigilante the Green Hornet fought crime with the assistance of his martial-artist sidekick Kato and his weapons-enhanced car, the Black Beauty. The single-season series premiered September 9, 1966, and ran through July 14, 1967,2 lasting 26 episodes. The character had originated as the star of a 1930s to 1950s radio series, and had previously been adapted to movie serials, comic books, and other media. Production Despite character co-creator George W. Trendle's failed efforts to generate interest in a Green Hornet TV series in 1951 and 1958, the success of ABC's mid-1960s Batman series prompted the network to adapt the venerable radio and movie-serial masked crime fighter the Green Hornet. The series starred Van Williams as the Green Hornet and introduced martial artist Bruce Lee to American television audiences as his sidekick Kato. Unlike the campy Batman series, The Green Hornet was played straight. Though it was canceled after one season, Lee became a major star of martial arts movies. Lee's popularity in Hong Kong, where he was raised, was such that the show was marketed there as The Kato Show. The Green Hornet and Kato also made appearances on Batman. Differences from radio version As with the later years of the radio version, secretary Lenore "Casey" Case, played by Wende Wagner, is again aware of Reid's secret, and the Hornet also has a confidante within the law enforcement community, but now he is District Attorney Frank P. Scanlon, played by Walter Brooke. This character was changed from the original's police commissioner because the Batman TV series was already using a man in that post as the hero's official contact, and William Dozier, the executive producer of both programs, wanted to downplay comparisons between the two shows. Michael Axford (Lloyd Gough), the bodyguard turned reporter of the radio series, is now solely a police reporter for The Daily Sentinel, the newspaper owned by Britt Reid/the Green Hornet. Reid in this series owned a television station as well. There were visual differences as well. Promotional artwork for the radio program and the comic books of the day depicted the Hornet wearing a mask that covered all of his face below the eyes (the two Universal Studios Saturday matinee serials contained a full face mask with eye holes) while Kato wore goggles. Here, both men wear masks that cover only the upper portions of their faces. These masks initially had a stylized angularity that soon proved problematical — neither man could see much. They were soon replaced with masks molded to the performers' faces. In a technological update, the Hornet carried a telescoping device called the Hornet's Sting, which projected ultrasonic soundwaves. He most frequently used it to open locked doors, although he was also seen using it to set things on fire (presumably by vibrating them and causing friction heat) and to threaten criminals to get information. In the episode "The Secret of the Sally Belle" the Hornet actually shot a thug with it, resulting in the criminal's being hospitalized. Kato The television version also had Kato using green "sleeve darts" to give him a ranged attack he could use to counter enemies both at a distance and in hand-to-hand combat. The impression Bruce Lee made at the time is demonstrated by one of the TV series tie-in coloring books produced by Watkins & Strathmore, titled, Kato's Revenge Featuring the Green Hornet. Theme music and opening Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's orchestral interlude, "Flight of the Bumblebee", used for the radio series, was so strongly identified with The Green Hornet that it was retained as the theme, rearranged by Billy May (who also composed the new background scores), and conducted by Lionel Newman, with trumpet solo by Al Hirt, in a jazz style nicknamed '"Green Bee". Each episode begins with the following monologue, narrated by producer William Dozier: Years later, the Billy May music was featured in the 2003 film, Kill Bill, Vol. 1, in which Quentin Tarantino paid tribute to Kato by featuring dozens of swordfighters wearing Kato masks during one of film's fight sequences. Black Beauty The TV series featured the Green Hornet's car, Black Beauty, a 1966 Imperial Crown sedan customized by Dean Jeffries at a cost of US$50,000, part of which went toward the car's paint job: 30 coats of metal flake, pure black green pearl of essence lacquer hand-rubbed to a high gloss. An article in TV Guidewhere? published during the show's network run made reference to disparaging comments made within the industry about ABC being "the two-car network" because of the Black Beauty and the Batmobile. Storage and Deployment The Black Beauty was stored underneath Brit Reid's garage. A set of switches on a secret control panel behind a tool wall would sequentially 1) lower the lights; 2) attach clamps to the axles of Reid's personal car; 3) rotate the floor of the garage - hiding Reid's car and bringing up the Black Beauty; and 4) unclamp the Black Beauty's axles. The Black Beauty would then exit the garage through a hidden rear door, and enter the street from behind a billboard that was cleverly designed to separate down the middle and rejoin. Weaponry, surveillance and security features The Black Beauty could fire explosive charges from tubes hidden behind retractable panels below the headlights which were said to be rockets with explosive warheads; had a concealed-when-not-in-use, drop-down knock-out gas nozzle in the center of the front grille and the vehicle could launch a small flying video/audio surveillance device (referred to as the scanner) through a small rectangular panel in the middle of the trunk lid. Working "rockets" and "gas nozzles" were incorporated into the trunk lid as well. The TV series employed an audio device from the radio show. In its era, the engines of cheaper cars made a lot of noise; the expensive Pierce-Arrow was reputed to be extremely quiet. So, when the Green Hornet said, "rig for silent running," the hornet-like buzz on the radio show was turned off and the listener was left to imagine that the car really was silent. On TV, the car sounded like a modern car, but the noise was removed from the soundtrack after this command. "Infra-green" headlights The Beauty's regular headlight cluster supposedly could be flipped over to reveal what studio publicity described as "infra-green" headlights. However, the car's headlights were not actually rigged to flip, so the green filters were seen deployed constantly. It was revealed in the related The Green Hornet spin-off Gold Key comic book that the green headlights used polarized light which in combination with the appropriately polarized vision filter (translucent green sun visor-like panels that could be pulled down when needed) could provide almost as much illumination as conventional headlights while being extremely dim – almost invisibly dark – to someone without the filter. In some early episodes in two-shots with both Van Williams and Bruce Lee inside the Black Beauty, as seen through the windshield, Lee's face was tinted green since he was supposedly seen through a "polarized" filter in the form of a large pull-down, transparent green-gray visor; Williams on the other hand was seen in normal light. The tint is not present in close-ups of Lee alone. Since specification of what this lighting was supposed to indicate never actually made it into any finished episode, the effect was unexplained to the audience and soon discontinued. However, most night shots were actually filmed during the daytime by the day for night technique, giving the illusion of night-time as the actual car headlights were not polarized but just had green lenses, which would render the headlights useless for real night-driving. As the series progressed, the process was executed less effectively, reaching the point where the viewer would need context to understand that some scenes were supposed to be taking place at night, as can be observed in screening the episodes in either original network airing or syndication (production) order. Post-series In 1992, Green Hornet enthusiast Dan Goodman, purchased the "number one" Black Beauty from the former transportation director of Twentieth Century Fox for the sum of US $10000 and commissioned Jeffries to restore it; two cars had been built for the series and Goodman's was the primary car. Although the vehicle was in perfect mechanical condition with the original custom wheels and most body modifications as used in the show and had logged only 17,000 miles (approximately 27,350 km) since new, it was badly weathered. Despite numerous legal bouts between Jeffries and Goodman over cost overruns and rights to the "Black Beauty" name and likeness, Jeffries eventually restored the car to its current condition albeit incorrect regarding the condition during the series. While the rocket launcher panels on the trunk lid had been welded shut, requiring replacement of the body panel in order to make the system functional again, the flip-down green headlights were intact less their drive motor and discovered beneath the hood after Goodman took delivery. The Black Beauty is part of the Petersen Automotive Museum collection; the "Number Two" Black Beauty resides in a private collection in South Carolina. Cast *Van Williams as Britt Reid/Green Hornet *Bruce Lee as Kato *Walter Brooke as Frank Scanlon *Lloyd Gough as Mike Axford *Wende Wagner as Lenore "Casey" Case Episodes # The Silent Gun # Give 'Em Enough Rope # Programmed for Death # Crime Wave # The Frog is a Deadly Weapon # Eat, Drink, and Be Dead # Beautiful Dreamer — Part 1 # Beautiful Dreamer — Part 2 # The Ray is for Killing # The Preying Mantis # The Hunters and the Hunted # Deadline for Death # The Secret of the Sally Bell # Freeway to Death # May the Best Man Lose # The Hornet and the Firefly # Seek, Stalk and Destroy # Corpse of the Year — Part 1 # Corpse of the Year — Part 2 # Ace in the Hole # Bad Bet on a 459-Silent # Trouble for Prince Charming # Alias The Scarf # Hornet Save Thyself # Invasion from Outer Space — Part 1 # Invasion from Outer Space — Part 2 Other appearances Batman TV series Van Williams and Bruce Lee cameo as The Green Hornet and Kato in a 1966 episode of the Batman TV series, "The Spell of Tut." The following year the pair starred with Batman and Robin in two episodes "A Piece of the Action" and "Batman's Satisfaction" where The Green Hornet and Kato are in Gotham City to bust a counterfeiting stamp ring. Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story The 1993 American semi-fictionalized film biography of Bruce Lee depicts Lee (Jason Scott Lee) meeting fictional producer Bill Krieger (Robert Wagner) after a martial arts tournament, and being hired to play Kato in The Green Hornet series. The movie shows the fictionalized shooting of the first episode, where cast and crew are impressed by Lee's martial arts skills. Van Williams plays the director of the episode. Category:Adaptations